Friday Film #2

Rebel Without a Cause

I'm really good

I watched this film with my parents, who I had a feeling were anxious to see whether I related to Jim, the main character brilliantly portrayed by James Dean. His struggle with behaving as a man should, with confusing influences from his dad, guys at school and the policeman, are shown by his extreme emotions throughout the film. The girlfriend serves to steady Jim as he becomes more confident in his new surroundings.  These factors of teenage life are spot on, I'm sure they relate to many more people who saw this film as they did to me (plus I own a red jacket, as I know many more do as a result of its iconic status when donned by Dean).
Yet while we see Jim as an unstable young man with a number of conflicts arising from his detachment from the family and lack of any other constant in his life, it is the quiet and calm Plato who emerges as the real threat. His reaction to the turbulence of teenage life is to defend himself by placing the power back in his own hands via a gun, the opposite of Jim who is able to embrace the possibilities open to a lovable rogue and get himself a babe.
This film could be seen as one of the first in a series of countless high school films in which good looks and confidence prevail over the 'geeks'. But this would minimise it to a film about high school. I found it to be one of the more convincing accounts of the transition from boy to man, something I don't recall from the many films made since which attempt to tackle the same subject.